Coimbra, Portugal September 3 – 7, 2007 International Conference on Engineering Education – ICEE 2007 Engineering Students in Needed Communities: an Engineering Education Tool S.M. Toffoli, D. Lauria, M.I. Piffer, A.L.C. Mariani Polytechnic School – University of São Paulo Av. Prof. Mello Moraes, 2463 – 05508-970 – São Paulo, SP, Brazil E-mail: toffoli@usp.br Abstract - This paper describes the experiences of small groups of Engineering students from various areas visiting different needed communities in Brazil. They spent up to 12 days together, within the community, talking to ordinary residents and community leaders, identifying opportunities of transforming specific needs of the community into Engineering projects, which would be offered to be developed later in the year by a single student or by a small group of students. So far, three kinds of communities were visited: a rural community in Central Brazil (in the interior of the State of Tocantins), which included a Brazilian Indian Reservation; a slum (called “Rocinha”) in the City of Rio de Janeiro; and a poor neighborhood in the suburban metropolitan area of São Paulo City. These activities are part of a broader Institutional program developed at the Polytechnic School of the University of São Paulo, called “Poli Cidadã”, and were carried out jointly with students from the Massachussetts Institute of Technology – MIT (Boston, USA). The results of these efforts were very positive, with great involvement of the students, who had the possibility of exercising, among other things, collaborative work, and their creative Engineering views, representing a useful auxiliary Engineering Education Index Terms – field trip, graduation project, group work. INTRODUCTION The Polytechnic School of the University of São Paulo (“Poli-USP”) is a Public State University Engineering School which has presently over 4000 undergraduate Engineering students, covering 13 different habilitation areas. In 2004, as one of the results of the Strategic Plan extensively discussed within the Institution in the previous year, a new Program was created, called “Programa Poli- Cidadã”, intended to enhance the social responsibility and sensitivity of the undergraduate students. The program was initially designed to be a connection between the desire of a significant percentage of the students and instructors in developing themes which have been originated from social demands and the various kinds of Institutions which actually faced such demands in their daily activities. Therefore, the way of materializing the idea was to organize a website within the School’s domain which was fed by the social themes (www.poli.usp.br/policidada). An interested Institution can access the website and record its needs. A detailed electronic registration form is required for that, containing details and purposes of the organization. The information is always filtered by the committee, which allows to go public only the themes and ideas really coming from ethic, non-profit organizations (or departments from any level of government) notably compromised with some social sector. Once the theme becomes available in the site, Polytechnic School students and instructors can access the information provided, and these themes can hence be developed by the student(s) and may also be turned into his or her graduation project. Every year a Seminar is organized by the managing committee of the “Poli-Cidadã” Program, when the concluded projects are briefly presented and certificates are awarded to all involved students and Professors. The organizations are also invited to the event. After the basic activities of the Program were tested, which included visits to social organizations in order to stimulate their participation in our Program, the range of activities of the initiative was broadened. By establishing collaborations with partners – other universities and private corporations – an intensive work modality was started. In this way of working, a group of 4-5 students with the most adequate profiles was selected from a large group of interested students, and visited, for a period of 7 to 12 days, a poor community, in order to identify opportunities of transforming specific needs of the community into Engineering project. This way, the students worked in groups, and they remained within the community for the whole period of time, when possible. The places to be visited were chosen together with the partners. So far, three different communities were visited: • A rural community in Central Brazil, in the interior of the State of Tocantins, called Canuanã, which included a Brazilian Indian Reservation (in this paper, special attention to this activity will be given) • A urban slum, called “Rocinha”, in the City of Rio de Janeiro; • A poor neighborhood in the suburban metropolitan area of São Paulo City, called Jardim Conceição (municipality of Osasco). SELECTION PROCESS The Engineering students who took part in the activities here described were selected by a selection process realized in three steps. The Canuanã – Rio de Janeiro raised the greater number of interested students. About 35 to 40 students wanted to join in the voluntary initiative, and demanded the longer selection process. At first, all Poli-USP